


Dormouse, Inc

by Siyah_Kedi



Category: Original Work
Genre: old, originally written in 2010
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-01
Updated: 2018-05-01
Packaged: 2019-04-30 19:26:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14503881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siyah_Kedi/pseuds/Siyah_Kedi
Summary: Intended to be a retelling of the Alice in Wonderland story, with psychics.





	1. Chapter 1

At least two dozen candles burned, throwing the whole room into soft, flickering shadows.  She sat in the middle of the room, reading a book by the glow generated by the little flames, utterly unaware of the people creeping like burglars towards the house she occupied alone.

 _Bad news,_ _guys._   The voice in his mind was his telepathic foster brother, Kevin, and Dante jerked at the surprise interruption.  He was trying to figure out the best way to get into the house without alarming their quarry – or the girl sitting in the living room with the candles and book.  _There’s only one person in here, and guess what.  We’re looking at her._

Dante and Kevin looked to their ‘father’ Dimitri, a precognitive from Russia who’d never quite lost his accent.  He looked as surprised by the news as they were; not reassuring.  “The daughter,” he said softly.  “A shield, perhaps?”

“Why wouldn’t it have been in the briefing, then?”

“Our masters are not omniscient,” Dimitri said wryly. 

 

Alicia turned a page in her novel, then looked up suddenly as something outside caught her attention.  A branch from the nearby tree _thwacked_ against the window again as the breeze played through its leaves and she relaxed.  Her parents had taken a surprise vacation two days ago, leaving her in the house alone.  For the most part, she reveled in the solitude – and the chance to burn as many candles as she wanted.  She’d always had a fondness for burning things, and still remembered her father warning her that she was not to burn the house down or set any part of it on fire for any reason when she was just a small child.  They usually drew the line at ten burning at once, and the dozens that surrounded her on every available flat surface were making her more relaxed than she’d been in days, ever since they’d announced they were leaving town on a business trip and would be extending it into a mini-break when they were through with their work.  Her parents were often away from home on business, and Alicia had grown up with what she called her ‘part-time parents.’

The branch smacked into the window again, drawing her attention, and as she watched, a most curious thing happened.  The branch pulled away from the window, and _stayed away._  

She could see the rest of the tree swaying in the wind, but the single branch that connected with the house was rigid as if it had suddenly been petrified.  The still branch was her only warning before two strange men dressed in black burst into the room, shouting at her to get down.  The candles flickered warningly.

Alicia dropped her book and sank onto the floor, her hands on her head.  “What are you doing?  Is this a robbery?  I don’t know the combination!”  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a third man enter the room.  The first two spread out a little, not touching anything but peering into every corner as though they expected someone to ambush them. 

One of the men laughed, and was hurriedly shushed by the other. 

“Please,” she said, not quite begging.  “I don’t even know where the safe is.”

“We’re not here to rob you, girl.”  The man’s accent was curious, unfamiliar.  “Just tell us where your parents are.”

Icy cold dread settled into her stomach.  “They’re on vacation,” she said.  The three men exchanged a glance.  The one who’d laughed shrugged.

“She’s telling the truth.”

A lithe black shape trotted into the sitting room, sleek black fur reflecting the orange of the many candles which continued to flicker and reach with a life of their own.   “Loki!” Alicia sprang from her position on the floor, reaching for her beloved cat in case one of these men was here to do harm to them.  They were only a few feet apart, but she never made it.  One of the men flung his arms out, and a solid force hit her in the side, flinging her against the wall and away from her cat.  She struggled, but it was as if she were suddenly immersed in molasses.  The candle flames roared upwards, singeing the walls and blackening the ceiling. 

“ _Hatter_!”

The tall man with the accent shouted, his eyes wide.  Alicia had time to be curious about the name, realise it was a nickname, and then nothing else, because several of the candles she’d been burning tipped over and suddenly the smell of burning carpet fibers filled the room.  Noise and smoke followed quickly after it.

“My _house!_ ”

“You idiot!” 

“Hatter, what are you thinking of?”

“I didn’t mean to knock anything over, but – _what is she doing?_ ”

Alicia was watching the flames slowly recede, leaving charred sections of carpet behind them.  At the sudden silence from the robbers, her concentration broke and the fire sprang back, twice as hungrily.  The flames crackled and snapped as they reached her book.

“Get the girl,” the accented man said suddenly.  The two other men with him looked at him, just as stunned as Alicia herself was. 

“Raven, but –”

“ _Now_!”

Alicia drew herself up to her full height of five foot five, and stomped her foot.  “I don’t know who you people are, or what you’re doing here, but I’m not going anywhere with you!  I’m going to call the fire department and the police and – ”

“Sorry, sweetheart,” said one of the men, just before he swept her up over his shoulder.  She screamed, kicking and flailing.  The fires around her had spread and grown; most of the living room was full of smoke.  Helplessly, Alicia watched the only home she’d ever known be consumed by the fire she’d loved so much. 

Her desperation at what was obviously a robbery-turned-abduction was interrupted, if not entirely dissipated, as she realised that Loki was still somewhere in the house.  “Stop!”

“What now?”

“Loki!”

“A _cat?_ ”

“We’re running out of time!”

Still kicking, Alicia landed a solid blow on the V where her captors legs met.  With a howl of rage and pain, he dropped her, doubling over in pain.  Taking advantage of her freedom, Alicia ran from the room, the flames shrinking back before her and closing in behind her.  She heard the tall man shout for ‘Hatter’ again, and suddenly the flames began winking out. 

Feet thundering on the floor behind her let her know that they’d gotten past the fire, but she’d found Loki cowering in the bathroom away from the noise and heat of the fire, and she cradled him close.  It didn’t matter now what they did; she had her best friend again, and they were both safe. 

“I don’t care about the damn cat,” said the man, though she hadn’t heard anything before it.  “Just get them both.  Maybe she can tell us more when we’re not _surrounded by fire._ ”

Even as terrified and wrung out as she was feeling by the night’s events, Alicia still found a corner of her mind to be amused by the man’s flat sarcasm in the face of danger.

_Kick me again, and I’ll have Da- the Hatter freeze you up._

The voice had no earthly source.  It rung through her mind, echoing in the thoughts banging around inside her head.  One of the men poked his head into the bathroom, and beckoned her.  A fierce headache bloomed inside her head as she followed him back towards the still-burning living room.  The second man – not the leader, but not the one she’d escaped from once already – was glaring at the flames in the room.  One by one, they were shrinking and going out altogether, and with each tiny fire that disappeared, her headache grew worse. 

“Raven,” said her captor, warningly.  Alicia had time to glance around her at the devastation of her once pristine home, and suddenly everything was too much.  The disembodied voice, the force that had thrown her into the wall and bruised her entire right side from shoulder to calf, the mere _presence_ of these strangers in her house was too much. 

“Fuck, _hot!_ ”

“Hare, what’s wrong?”

“She’s hot!”

Alicia was beyond hearing them.  The fires surrounding her blossomed like flowers as the force of her emotions overwhelmed her.  The last thing she remembered seeing was the horrified, dumbfounded expressions of them men who’d invaded her home were surrounded by fire.


	2. Chapter 2

There was a television on somewhere.  Alicia struggled out of some of the strangest dreams she’d ever had in her life, and the steady drone of a reporter’s voice was the first thing she was aware of in her surroundings.  She drew back to herself long enough to think, _that’s weird, I never turn the TV on,_ and then what the reporter was actually _saying_ sank in.

“Preliminary police reports say that the fire started around eleven PM last night, and was most likely the result of a candle being tipped over.  No one was in the house while it burned, and the whereabouts of the family who lived there are as yet a mystery.  Anyone with information on the fire or the White family’s whereabouts are encouraged to call the hotline at –”

The house burned down.  Caught somewhere between shock and despair, Alicia suddenly remembered the three strange men who’d burst into her house just before the blaze started. 

She sat up, alarmed, and looked around her.  The room was as unfamiliar as the moon.  Drawing her terror around her like a cloak, she took the only option available to her in circumstances like these ones.

She screamed.

 

Dante jumped as the unholy shriek echoed through the safe house.  The pen he was using to write the report stabbed through the paper, leaving a tear right through his debriefing, and he scowled at the paper.  Kevin strolled in through the open door and lounged against its frame, smiling like a Cheshire cat. 

“Guess who just woke up,” he announced cheerily.  Dante shifted his scowl to his brother, shaking his head. 

“I heard her.  I think they heard her in Kansas.”

“Ah, the joys of sound-proofed walls.  I’m surprised you heard her in here.  Dimitri didn’t.”

Dante ignored his brother, drawing another sheet of paper towards him to start fresh on his report.  He found himself as stumped on the new paper as he’d been on the old one.  How was he supposed to describe _just_ how badly things had gone the night before?  The mission had initially been simple when Bishop came to them with the tape from Queen, their anonymous employer.  Get into the house, get the two Whites who were under suspicion of illegal psionic – adventures – and bring them back to Queen for questioning and detainment. 

That the Whites had effectively disappeared, leaving behind their only daughter who was, according to their intel reports, _supposed_ to have been away at school in Massachusetts, had not been in the plans.  Nor had abducting said daughter.  He could hear Kevin laughing at him silently at the turn his thoughts had taken, but couldn’t even bring himself to muster up a nasty look for his brother. 

“So do you want to do the honours, or should I?”

Dante arched one eyebrow.  “I’ll do it.  She might kick you again.”

 

The tall blond from the night before walked carefully into her room.  Alicia eyed him warily, uncertain of what he was there for.  Her scream had brought no immediate attention, but served its purpose of making her feel better, and she just didn’t think she had another one in her yet. 

“You must be hungry,” he said at last.  “It’s been a while since you ate anything, hasn’t it?”

There was just a trace of a burr to his voice, more of a lilt than an accent, and far too faint for her to place.  It sounded like it ought to be familiar, though, and her inability to place it put her even further on her guard. 

“Why am I here?”

He paused, and the television shut itself off with a quiet click and buzz.  “You don’t pull any punches, do you?”

“Who are you,” she said, just as firmly.  “Why am I here?”

He looked her over slowly, then shifted his attention to something behind her.  For a moment, Alicia wasn’t going to let herself be distracted, but that was before she heard the familiar meow. 

“Loki!”

The kitten mewed again, leaping up into her arms.  His fur smelled smoky, but he was otherwise unharmed.  He was purring hard enough to rattle them both, but it was a reassuring purr and she turned back to her captors with a steadier heart. 

“I’m Dante,” he said after a few minutes of silence.  “Welcome to the Tea Party.”

 

Dimitri looked the girl over.  She was thin as a whip, and pale, but there was a fire in her eyes that made him think he and his boys hadn’t made such a mistake in bringing her here.  Bishop – and most likely Queen, too – would likely have their heads on silver plates for revealing the secret, but he’d had just a flash back at her house that she was more than she seemed. 

“I regret,” he said, “that I am unable to tell you very much about why you are here or who we are.  Lives may very well be forfeit for that information.  Rest assured that we mean you no harm.”

The words were barely out of his mouth before they both realised how insane they sounded.  “You break into my house, set it on fire and – and _burn it down_ – and then you kidnap me and _now_ you’re telling me you don’t mean me any harm?”  Her hands closed into fists at her sides, rage as clear as printed words written across her face.

“She’s a little firecracker, isn’t she?”  Kevin stepped out of the shadows to lean beside his brother against the wall.  She turned to stare at them as if they were ganging up on her, and, he supposed, from her point of view they very well may be. 

A vision flickered on the edge of his awareness, but would come no farther into clarity.  “I suppose the best way of proving we mean no harm would be to share our – tea party,” Dimitri said after a few moments of tense silence.

Queen had a soft spot for Lewis Carroll’s novels “ _Alice_ _’s Adventures in Wonderland”_ and _“Through the Looking Glass”_ and it showed in nearly everything she did. 

Kevin turned towards Dante.  “You’ve got the most visually impressive one of us; why don’t you show off for the lady?”

Alicia’s eyes wavered between the two of them, not sure which one to watch.  Not for the first time, Dimitri wished one of them – himself preferably – was an empath.  It would be so helpful sometimes, especially when dealing with his two boys.  Throwing a girl into the mix was simply asking for trouble.  At least there was a chance he’d See it before it got to that point.

Hopefully.

Dante took a deep breath, holding his hand out in front of him, palm up.  A sudden breeze ruffled his hair as he drew on the power resting within him, and suddenly a deck of cards burst up off the table.  One by one, they flew out of the pack to form a tornado above his fingers.  Without watching – this was one of his exercises – Dante directed the cards into ever widening circles, until the entire deck was whirling around the room in an intricate dance.

“No,” Kevin said suddenly, apparently answering someone’s thought.  “You’re not going crazy.  He’s really doing that.  And yes,” he added, a grin pulling at the corners of his mouth, “I’m really reading your thoughts.  This is our tea party.  We’re the good guys, and we work for the government.  That’s all you need to know right now.”

Alicia was gaping at him, clearly stunned.  The vision firmed up in his mind now that the time was upon them, and Dimitri calmly moved to place his hands on her shoulders.  He felt her tense up beneath his fingers, but she allowed him to move her back two or three steps; not a moment later, Dante lost control of the cards and several shot into the floor where she’d been standing.

Her terrified look turned to land on him, and underneath his hand her shoulder felt like it was on fire.  “What _are_ you people?”

Dimitri’s inner-eye blinded him, the vision coming with a clarity that he’d rarely seen.  Alicia standing in the middle of what looked like a warehouse, flames roaring around her while she looked on, utterly calm in the center of the inferno.  The boys knew better than to interrupt him when he was in the grip of his Gift, but Alicia – poor, teenaged Alicia who’d never done anything in her life to warrant the situation she now found herself in – was frightened by the way he suddenly went rigid and stared sightlessly at the wall behind them. 

“Just think of us as… well, have you ever seen that movie?” Dimitri vaguely heard Kevin trying to explain – trying and failing, judging by the expression on Alicia’s face.

“‘That movie,’ huh?” asked Dante

Kevin scoffed.  “The one with the jumpsuits and that guy who had claws in his hands.  I know you’ve seen it, everyone has.  Think of us as those guys in the jumpsuits.”

Dimitri felt it was time to step in, before it came to violence between the three of them.  “We are a select group of government agents known as Psionic Operations Specialists.”  Inwardly, he was thinking that it wouldn’t harm her to tell her; as soon as Queen found out what they’d done, she would order the girl taken to the PsiOps telempath back at headquarters, where both her feelings about the kidnapping and her memories of her time here would be completely rearranged for her.  It wasn’t a pleasant thought, but at least they could make her life a little bit easier while she was here.

But the vision of Alicia surrounded by flames wouldn’t leave him alone.


	3. Chapter 3

Kevin listened to the thoughts buzzing around him like bees.  Alicia was terrified and disbelieving, still sure they’d kidnapped her for ransom and hadn’t even begun to assimilate the fact that they’d announced to her face that they worked for the American government.  Dante was berating himself for losing control of the cards during his demonstration and thinking about their front-man, Mike, and Dimitri was considering the fate of their unexpected guest.  He’d known from the start that Queen would want to take a look at her, would at the very least send Bishop to take a look at her, but he didn’t realise that the minute they involved her, her memories and life were forfeit.  If Queen didn’t have her rewritten entirely, she would at least spend the rest of her life in a government housing block, where they could keep an eye on her and prevent her from telling anyone about the PsiOps. He supposed it would be easier to just wipe her memories, rewrite her personality a bit, and stick her in the witness protection program where – still – her life and family would be forfeit. 

He wondered how much of a favour they’d done her by taking her out of the house.

The cat strolled into the room, looking as comfortable in the safe house as if he’d lived there his whole life.  Alicia dropped to her knees and held him close, taking comfort in the only place she could find it.  It made Kevin feel a little bit guilty for the role he’d played in destroying her life.  Dormouse Inc had been formed to save lives, not steal them. 

Dimitri interrupted his introspection by suddenly striding towards the phone.  Less than a second after he reached it, it rang shrilly, startling Alicia into a shriek she hurriedly muffled against the cat’s black fur. 

“Dimitri,” he said gruffly, and Kevin bit his lip, knowing immediately that it was Queen and that she was _not pleased._   Reaching out with the power in his mind, he touched Dante, and warned him that Bishop was on his way.

“Yes,” Dimitri said, but Kevin heard the conversation echoing in his mind.

 _‘You were to get the Whites and bring them to me.  Do you realise how much trouble you’ve placed us all in by keeping that girl at the_ safe house?’

“Yes.”

_‘Bishop and Knight are on their way.  Be ready.’_

“Yes.”

Kevin felt a moment of fear.  Knight was the telempath, the one who could read not only the thoughts, but the _emotions_ of others, read and manipulate.  He was horrifyingly powerful, and the entire PsiOps department lived in abject terror of him. 

“Bad news,” Dimitri said, hanging up the phone and turning back to his boys and the girl they’d brought in.

 

Just when she thought it couldn’t get any worse, _it got worse._   That was the only thing Alicia could focus on after the announcement that _more_ of these psychic mutant freaks were coming to – to look at her, to take her away, to do _something_ and all she wanted was to go home, go back to sleep, and wake up and pretend that this crazy, nightmare day had never happened.  Her house and all her things weren’t a smoking heap of ashes.  Her parents weren’t missing.  She hadn’t been kidnapped by crazy people.

 _It wasn’t happening._   Unfortunately, the rest of her didn’t believe the lies she was trying to tell herself.  She heard Kevin laughing quietly behind her.

“I’m glad you find something funny about this, Kevin,” Dimitri said, and the dark-haired boy sobered up.  Alicia allowed herself a small smile, then focused her attention on the man who could apparently see the future.

“Bishop and Knight are coming to see Alicia.  Alicia, since you obviously have no way of knowing, Bishop is the middle man between the government and the other PsiOps teams like Dormouse.  Knight is…”

All three men swallowed hard, and Alicia felt a renewed surge of icy terror that this Knight should so frighten even _them._  

“Knight is a telempath,” Dante said, when it looked like Dimitri wasn’t going to be able to say anything. 

“That – ” she started, but her voice broke.  She cleared her throat and tried again.  “That doesn’t tell me anything.”

To her surprise, it was Kevin who stood up next, no traces of mockery left on his face now.  “Sure you know what telepaths are, right?”

“Mind readers,” Alicia ventured.  Kevin nodded.

“Telekinetics?”

Her eyes flickered over to Dante, who nodded.  “Like – like that movie, _Carrie,_ ” Alicia said.  “People who move things with their minds.”

A smirk lifted the corners of Kevin’s mouth.  “The girl can learn,” he said to no one.  “Precognitive.”

A blank look fell over her face.  The word wasn’t even familiar.  Kevin flicked his eyes up to Dimitri.

“Prescient, oracle.  People who see the future.  Empath?” The quiz continued.

Alicia shook her head.  “I know… empathy,” she said.  “Feeling for other people.  Compassion, and sympathy, right?”

“Empaths are psions who can read people’s emotions like words on a book.  They can manipulate those emotions at will.  There are… other types of psions.  Pyrokinetics are rare, so are hydrokinetics.  People who control fire and water,” Kevin said, and Alicia felt a thrill go up her spine.  He gave her an odd look at the sudden unintelligible burst of thoughts that splattered across her mind, but she couldn’t even catch onto one of them quick enough to make sense of it.  “There are two kinds of psion,” Kevin continued with his lecture, ignoring her.  “There’s the mental – precognitives, telepaths – and the physical; all of the kinetics.  Then there are empaths.  Empaths are the single most frightening people you will _ever meet._   Because unlike telepaths and precogs, they don’t just look at what you’re feeling or doing or thinking.  They can manipulate it.”

“Pain, pleasure.  Fear.  Hate.  Happiness.  Love.  All of these things can be molded and twisted according to the empath’s wishes.  What you’re actually feeling is of no consequence.  If you run into an empath who wants you out of his way, he can twist what you’re feeling into nothing.  He can make it so you don’t even want to come after him, or get in his way.  And he has the choice to make it so you don’t ever want to do anything again.  You’d become little more than a doll, unable to muster up the energy to do even the simplest things.”  Dimitri’s voice was frighteningly level.

“Why are you telling me all of this?”

“Because,” Dante said, speaking for the first time.  “That’s the guy who’s coming here to look at you.  That’s what he can do.”

 

Bishop sighed heavily.  Dormouse had – up until this point – been one of their most powerful and reliable teams.  Queen was understandably upset that the mission had gone so foul, but even he found himself a little terrified by the telempath sitting shotgun beside him.  Knight was silent, but their eyes met briefly in the rear view mirror, and Bishop saw the hint of a smirk playing at his lips.  Biting back a shiver, Bishop returned his attention to the road.  The smell of the power rolling off his unwanted companion was enough of a distraction; he didn’t need to add the sight of that creepy smile to it. 

Since driving took little concentration, and because he needed some distraction from the psionic emanations pouring out of Knight, Bishop turned his attention to thoughts of the girl they were going to see.  Her name was Alicia White, and she was the only daughter of two politicians.  That much was public information.  Miss White made the news every so often on her own, but mostly because of her parents. 

The strange part came in when one dug deeper.  The illustrious Mr. and Mrs. White weren’t her parents any more than Knight and Queen were, and the politics were just a fabulous cover up for their shadier dealings with the North Koreans.  North Korea wanted power.  Any move in the direction of nuclear power would bring the entire United Nations down on their heads, and so they’d become sneaky.  Rumours of the PsiOps abounded, mostly in the tabloids and other sensational rags.  Even the one Dormouse ran as a front occasionally printed new rumours up – usually the ones Queen made up herself and told them to print, the better to deflect suspicion – but someone, somewhere, had taken the rumours as truth and begun digging.  That had been close to ten years ago, and the new rumours were that the North Koreans were developing a system of psionic spies, able to evade detection and capture by judicious application of their powers.  The Whites were the latest and most promising lead Queen had dug up in that direction in a long time, and the timing of their disappearance was only _too_ coincidental when held against the backdrop of the mission Queen sent to Dormouse.  Deck could have gotten it; Ace, Jack, Deuce and King were second only to Dormouse in terms of power and teamwork, and only because Ace was a fantastic distraction to the three other men on her team. 

His thoughts brought him back around to Alicia White.  There was no reason for the mission to have gone as badly as it did; Dormouse was too smoothly run, too cohesive to just – _fuck up_ – that badly.  And _why_ had Dimitri brought her back with him?

This meeting was going to be unpleasant in every sense of the word.

 

Dante placed himself on watch beside the window.  When the black sedan pulled up in the drive, he felt a momentary stab of panic before he quelled it.  It wouldn’t stop Knight from feeling it, not at this range, but it wouldn’t do to give himself away to his teammates.  “Here!” he shouted, and heard two sets of pounding footsteps trailed by a more timid third.

Dormouse arranged themselves in a semi-circle facing the door, with Alicia between Dimitri and Dante.  He used his gift to pull open the door before Knight or Bishop could knock, or worse, just push it open without announcing themselves, and the group caught their breath at the man striding into the room.

Knight was not a small man; football linebackers would look timid in comparison to him.  Rumours had it that he’d been a body-builder before Queen picked him up, and in the Marines before that.  His hair was still buzzed short, and he exuded an air of placidity despite the fact that each of his forearms was as thick as a normal man’s calf.  Dormouse collectively breathed a sigh of relief, and Dante knew that it was Knight’s Gift working on them, defusing their anticipation before it turned into anything else.

Bishop was at least as tall as Dimitri, but next to Knight, he looked childish and scrawny.  He had the most peculiar expression on his face, too, but Dante didn’t have time to examine their gopher before Knight stepped fully into the room and surveyed them.

“This is the girl?” His voice rumbled.

“My name is Alicia White,” Alicia said, stepping forward.  Dante didn’t know if her bravado was of her own creation or if Knight was giving it to her; after a second look, he decided the girl was either fiercely brave or fiercely stupid.  The look on Knight’s face as he was presented with this tiny slip of a girl who stood up to him with no visible trace of fear told Dante that anything Alicia was doing right now had nothing to do with anyone but herself.

 _That’s my girl,_ he thought, and then squelched it. 

Knight crouched slightly to bring himself closer to eyelevel with her.  Alicia simply stood up straighter, refusing to give ground before the giant of a man who could warp her emotions until they were no longer her own.  He could have picked her up in one hand and snapped her in half like a twig; still she gave no hint of fear.

“Are you in league with the enemy spies known to PsiOps as Jabberwocky?” Knight rumbled.  Alicia’s confusion was unfeigned.

“Enemy spies?  Jabberwocky?”

Knight seemed to draw back slightly, and Dante seethed with curiousity.  “Are you in league with the enemy agents known until late as Mary White and Jonathan White?”

Alicia’s face turned as pale as her name.  “They’re my parents.”

“Negative,” Knight said, and Dante fancied he could hear a bit of compassion in the man’s voice.  “They adopted you at the age of two years and three months in order to facilitate their cover as politicians.”

For the first time since Bishop and Knight had entered the safe house, Alicia’s lip trembled.  Her legs seemed unable to support her and she sank to the ground, still staring up at Knight in abject disbelief. 

Knight and Bishop shared a look.  Bishop stood forward.  “Excuse me miss,” he said, and leaned close to her.  In shock as she was, Alicia barely noticed.  Bishop was on Queens personal team for his ability to smell psionic powers.  Dimitri had explained it to him once that it wasn’t smelling in the same sense that sniffing a cup of coffee was smelling; it was something going on in his brain that allowed him to sense power, and it pretended to be going on in his nose because some people were weird.  Seeing Bishop leaning over the traumatised Alicia, sniffing her deeply, gave all four of the other psychics in the room a significant moment of pause. 

“This girl is psionic,” Bishop squeaked.


	4. Chapter 4

Pandemonium reigned.

“You’re joking!”

“You must be mistaken – ”

“ – I can’t believe – ”

“This has got to be a – ”

“Are you certain?”  Knight’s quiet question cut through the uproar like a hot knife through butter.  Bishop offered him a dirty look.

“It’s my job to be sure,” he said firmly, and then to Alicia, who still hadn’t noticed anything after Knight’s revelation, he said, “Are you all right then, dear?”

Alicia looked up at him, and Dimitri was horrified to realise that there were tears in her eyes.  His heart went out to her, especially in light of the revelations she’d been subjected to. 

“No,” she said, her voice wobbling.  “No, I’m not all right.  This is not all right!” 

“She’ll need to be taken to Queen,” Knight said.  Alicia scowled up at him – a little wildly, Dimitri thought.  He had only a split seconds warning, long enough to shout half a letter, when suddenly the carpet surrounding her caught fire. 

Spontaneously.

 

The flames roared up, blackening the ceiling and singing the eyebrows off Bishop, who was leaning too close.  Alicia sat in the middle of the sudden conflagration entirely unhurt.  Nothing she’d been told today was something she’d known, but somehow, she was entirely unsurprised by either.  And that was how she was able to stand in the middle of a raging fire and not flinch.  The flames felt comfortably warm to her when they danced too close, but they otherwise didn’t touch her.  She’d always had a fascination for fire.  Always loved burning things.  Her parents thought there was something special about that inclination, too, but they weren’t her parents and they probably had their own reasons for wanting to know if she displayed these powers.  The fire was rapidly growing beyond her control, and for the first time, she felt fear. 

It lasted only until someone unleashed the contents of a fire extinguisher at her.  Tiny pinpricks of pain flickered over her skin as the fires went out, leaving a charred circle on the carpet – a perfect circle, with an unblemished center where she’d been standing.

If any of them – including her – had had any doubts about the power in her that Bishop had just announced, they were suddenly doused just as quickly and effectively as the fire had been. 

“That was _wicked,_ ” Kevin said. 

“You need to come back with us,” said Knight.  Alicia stared at him, thrown off by the suddenness of everything.

“I can’t,” she said.  “I just – I’ve got to…”

“Miss White,” Bishop interrupted politely.  “Not only are you privy to _government secrets_ right now, you’ve also just displayed an immense amount of power.  Power we need right now.  You must be debriefed at headquarters and Queen will decide what to do with you.”

Alicia was on the brink of having a full melt-down when suddenly a wave of calm washed over her.  She glared at Knight, who looked stolidly back.  She couldn’t hold onto her anger at him, either.  Given what Dimitri and the others had told her about him, she supposed she should feel grateful that he wasn’t turning her into a zombie, but the irritation remained. 

“At a guess,” Bishop was telling Dimitri, “I’d say she was a level six at least.  And completely untrained, if what you’ve been telling me is true.  She _must_ be detained for preliminary training at the _least_.  Otherwise she could present a danger not only to what we’ve already accomplished, but to herself as well.”

Suddenly the Dormouse boys weren’t her enemies.  They’d come to take her parents away – her false parents, she had no parents – but they’d rescued her from the fire when the candles fell over.  They’d brought her here and kept her safe, and stood beside her when Knight and Bishop arrived. 

“I don’t want to go anywhere,” Alicia announced, surprising everyone.  “You can’t make me.”

“Yes,” Knight answered.  “I’m afraid we can.”

Something twisted inside her, and just for a moment, she thought ‘how strange’ before the power took hold. 

“Alright,” she said.  “I’ll go.  I’d rather be somewhere protected anyway.”

 

Dante was no less shocked than the others when Alicia – who’d been essentially kidnapped – opted to stay with them.  He knew as soon as the words were out of her mouth, however, that Knight would simply coerce her.  And too, he knew that this was likely the last time he’d ever see her.

Vaguely, he wondered why it actually hurt.

 

**

Alicia found herself sitting beside a hyperactive girl of about twelve, who insisted she was one of Queen’s personal body guards.  “They call me Rook,” she said, and Alicia could only shake her head and stare out the window at the unchanging ocean below the plane. 

She knew in her heart that Knight had done something to her, but her head couldn’t bring the rest of her to care.


End file.
